Hobbs and Shaw: Everything you need to know about the Fast & Furious spinoff

When Fast and Furious burst onto the scene in 2001, most thought of it as a standalone car movie but it became an unexpected hit. After a few a couple sequels (including the Fast and Furious: Tokyo Drift detour) and nearly the end of the franchise, it brought back stalwarts Vin Diesel and Paul Walker and semi-rebooted as action franchise that became one of the most successful franchise with eight movies made so far.

Given the outsized popularity of the franchise, it was only a matter of time before a spinoff movie was made so here comes Hobbs and Shaw.

The spinoff will be less about cars and more an action movie that sees Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson buddy up with Jason Statham and we can't wait to see it. Hobbs and Shaw won't hit theaters for another few months, but you can never know enough about highly anticipated movies. Here's everything you need to know about Hobbs and Shaw.

All the big details

Where is it coming out?

Release date: July 26, 2019

Director: David Leitch

Takes place after The Fate of the Furious

For the longest time, Universal Studios, the studio behind the Fast and Furious franchise, kept the official title under wraps. Well it did reveal the official title, we were blessed with this little number. The spinoff is officially titled Fast and Furious presents: Hobbs and Shaw. Say that fast five time.

Though that's the official title, we are going to keep it short and to the point and refer to it as Hobbs and Shaw as we suspect most people will.

As the name suggests, it will buddy action flick that focuses on Luke Hobbs (The Rock) and Deckard Shaw (Jason Statham). Both characters have made multiple appearances in the main Fast and Furious movies alongside Diesel and Walker, but now they get the chance to team up and go their separate ways.

To lead the action franchise the studio tapped action specialist David Leitch. He first made his mark co-directing the action-packed John Wick before directing the female version of it, Atomic Blonde, to most recently helming the director's chair for Deadpool 2. You can rest assured the movie will have plenty of action.

Who else is in it?

Aside from The Rock and Statham, which are two impressive names, the movie is rounded out by an impressive cast. Taking on the duo of Hobbs and Shaw will be Idris Elba portraying their antagonist, Brixton.

How bad ass will he be? Just take The Rock's word for it. He calls him the "baddest, most diabolical, most dominant and coolest guy in the Fast & Furious franchise has ever seen." That's some pretty high praise.

What is the movie about?

Up until now, details were scarce on the plot other than the obvious: Hobbs and Shaw would partner up to stop Brixton, but now that the trailer is out (which you can see above), we have way more details.

First off, Brixton appears to be a superhuman badass that's bulletproof. That's according to him, setting up what could be the most formidable antagonist the Fast and Furious franchise has ever seen.

From what we got in the trailer, Hattie Shaw is a government agent tasked with bringing Brixton down but when she sees how formidable, she calls in some help. This is where Hobbs and Shaw come into the fold making their way to Europe. As you'd expect, they have a lot of issues to work through none that will prevent them from saving the world.

This is when the movie gets off to the races and goes full-action mode with jaw-dropping scenes, including an epic and hilarious skyscraper scene where Brixton, carrying Hattie Shaw, runs down the side of a building. Yes, you read that right. Trying to catch him, Hobbs and Shaw bicker all the way down culminating in a very funny and inappropriate moment.

A rocky road to get made

It might seem like a slam dunk to make a Fast and Furious movie starring The Rock and Jason Statham, but that wasn't always the case. That's due to some behind-the-scenes drama taking place over at the main Fast and Furious franchise.

Though details are pretty non-existent, there were reports that The Rock and Vin Diesel had a falling out that contributed to the lack of screen time their two characters shared, in particular in The Fate of the Furious. The Rock went to so far as to call somebody in the cast a "candy ass" in a cryptic social media post.

The drama ensued with Tyrese Gibson taking shots at The Rock for pushing for Hobbs and Shaw movie getting made before Fast and Furious 9. Originally, Fast and Furious 9 was going to come out in 2019 but with Hobbs and Shaw gaining traction, the studio pushed it up year and delayed the next Fast and Furious movie for 2020.

The beef between the cast has somewhat settled with Hobbs and Shaw going through production and Fast and Furious bringing back Justin Lin to direct but the bigger question remains, will The Rock ever return to the main Fast and Furious movies again? That we won't know for a long time.